Literature

No detailed history of the manuscript English versions is in existence. A good summary of the pre-Wyclifite versions is given in the introduction to A.S. Cook's Biblical Quotations in Old English Prose Writers, part 1 (1898); and the principal separate publications have been mentioned above. For the Wyclifite versions the main authority is the complete edition by J. Forshall and F. Madden (4 vols., 1850); the New Testament in the later version was separately printed by Skeat (1879). A good short conspectus of the subject is given in the introduction to the official Guide to the Wycliffe Exhibition in the British Museum (1884). The printed Bible has been much more fully investigated. The best single authority is Bishop Westcott's History of the English Bible (3rd ed., revised by W. Aldis Wright, 1905); see also the article by J.H. Lupton in Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible (Extra Vol., 1904); W.F. Moulton, History of the English Bible (2nd ed., 1884); and H.W. Hoare, The Evolution of the English Bible (2nd ed., 1902). The Printed English Bible, by R. Lovett (R.T.S. "Present Day Primers," 1894) is a good short history, and the same may be said of G. Milligan's The English Bible (Church of Scotland Guild Text Books, new ed., 1907). For a bibliography of printed Bibles, see the section "Bible" in the British Museum Catalogue (published separately), and the Historical Catalogue of the Printed Editions of Holy Scripture in the Library of the British and Foreign Bible Society, vol. i., by T.H. Darlow and H.F. Moule (1903). For special and minute studies of certain parts of the subject, the works of F. Fry (The Bble by Coverdale, 1867, Description of the Great Bible, 1865, Bibliographical Description of the Editions of the New Testament, Tyndale's Version, 1878) and E. Arber (The First Printed English New Testament, 1871) are invaluable. Bagster's English Hexapla (which can often be obtained second-hand) gives in parallel columns, beneath the Greek Text as printed by Scholz, the New Testament according to (1) the second Wycliffite version; (2) Tyndale, from the edition of 1534; (3) the Great Bible of 1539; (4) the Geneva New Testament of 1557; (5) the Rheims New Testament of 1582; and (6) the Authorized Version of 1611. This gives the student a better idea of the evolution of the English Bible than any description. F.H.A. Scrivener's Authorised Edition of the English Bible (1884) gives a careful and authoritative account of the various editions of the Authorized Version. For the history of the Revised Version, see the Revisers' prefaces and Bishop Ellicott's Revised Version of Holy Scripture (S.P.C.K. 1901). A more extensive bibliography is given in Dr. Lupton's article in Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible.